The B-Lab 2024 - Bertolet Lab

As we close out 2024, we reflect on the remarkable growth of the Bertolet Lab during its second year. Formally established in the summer of 2023, our lab has thrived through a year of achievements and hard-fought progress. Beyond the accomplishments listed below, we have had the privilege of working with remarkable individuals whose energy, ingenuity, and kindness have deeply enriched our year. A special highlight of this year was the birth of Miguel Huesa Palomo on January 14^th, whose arrival brought joy and inspiration to the lab, very especially to his dad.

Alongside Alejandro Bertolet (PI), Carlos Huesa-Berral, Victor V. Onecha, and Jesús Bosque began 2024 as postdoctoral fellows in the lab, with Jesús departing in October. Mislav Bobić joined as a Medical Physics resident in July; and José Antonio López-Valverde joined as a postdoctoral fellow in September, leading a project in collaboration with the Berbeco Lab at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

Key events and milestones from 2024 include the following:

[January] Alejandro Bertolet earned a nomination for the MGH Rising Mentor Award from the Center for Faculty Development (CFD).
[April] Alejandro Bertolet was appointed Associate Director of the Radiation Biology Program at the MGH Department of Radiation Oncology
[June] Victor V. Onecha was invited to present at the Gordon Research Seminar “Radionuclide Theranostics for the Management of Cancer”
[July] Alejandro Bertolet was awarded an Extraordinary PhD Thesis Award by the Universidad de Sevilla
[August] Alejandro Bertolet was selected as one of the Emerging Leaders of Academic Medical Physics by the University of Wisconsin-Madison
[September] Alejandro Bertolet, Víctor V. Onecha and Jesús Bosque won Radiation Research Society Travel Awards
[September] Alejandro Bertolet was appointed Director of Radiopharmaceutical Dosimetry at the MGH Division of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
[September] Alejandro Bertolet received the NIH/NCI Administrative Supplement 3U54CA274516-02S1 to develop the project “A digital twin to track and predict the evolution of pediatric neuroblastoma tumors”
[October] Carlos Huesa-Berral received notice of award for the highly competitive Postdoctoral Fellowship from the American Cancer Society to develop the project “Computational Modeling and Simulation of Hepatic Tumors for Enhanced Transarterial Radioembolization”, which will start on Jan 1^st, 2025
[October] José Antonio López-Valverde and Victor V. Onecha were selected as finalists for the trainee competition at the second MGB Radiation Oncology Research retreat, with José Antonio López-Valverde winning the award
[October] Carlos Huesa-Berral won the best poster award from the John B. Little Symposium at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health
[November] Alejandro Bertolet was notified to be the next recipient of the John D. Boyle Young Investigator Award by the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP)
[November] Alejandro Bertolet received MGH ECOR Interim Support Funding to develop the project “Integration of Preclinical Models and Clinical Insights for Optimized Transarterial Radioembolization”

All these things also happened in 2024:

[March] Alejandro Bertolet joined the 2^nd MGB Radiation Oncology Research organizing committee
[May] Alejandro Bertolet was selected as a mentor in the Dana Farber/Harvard Cancer Center CURE Program
[May] Alejandro Bertolet was selected as a mentor in the AAPM Summer Undergraduate Fellowship Program
[May] Alejandro Bertolet was selected as a mentor in the DEI Summer Undergraduate Program by the MGH Division of Physics
[July] Victor V. Onecha, Carlos Huesa-Berral, and Alejandro Bertolet were selected as speakers at the Annual Meeting of the AAPM in Los Angeles, CA
[September] Victor V. Onecha and Alejandro Bertolet were selected as speakers at the Annual Meeting of the RRS in Tucson, AZ
[September] Carlos Huesa-Berral joined the AAPM Task Group on Microsphere Radioembolization
[September] Alejandro Bertolet and Carlos Huesa-Berral joined the AAPM Radiopharmaceutical Therapy Subcommittee as guests
[October] Alejandro Bertolet was appointed as Co-Director of the Radiopharmaceutical Track within the Program Committee of the AAPM Annual Meeting
[October] Alejandro Bertolet joined the Program Organizing Committee of the RRS Annual Meeting for 2025
[November] Alejandro Bertolet and Carlos Huesa-Berral became guest editors for the focus collection “Dosimetry for Radionuclide Therapy” in Physics in Medicine and Biology
[November] Carlos Huesa-Berral won an award from the COPE radio station in Malaga, Spain, as the citizen with the largest international projection; and was selected as the image of a campaign promoting education in Malaga, Spain

Our lab hosted numerous students for research stays, mentorship, and educational collaboration. In particular:

Gerardo Julián Ramírez Nava was a visiting postdoctoral fellow from the Tecnologico de Monterrey in Mexico, from January to May
Marina García-Cardosa was an international PhD student visiting the Harald Paganetti group from the Universidad de Navarra in Spain who collaborated with us, from March to September
Zakiya Williams was an undergraduate student visiting as part of the DEI Summer Undergraduate Program by the MGH Division of Physics during the summer, who worked with Victor V. Onecha
Alex Culver was an undergraduate student visiting as part of the AAPM Summer Undergraduate Program during the summer, who worked with Carlos Huesa-Berral
Alvaro Sebastian Cuervo was a high-school student visiting as part of the DF/HCC CURE Program during the summer, who worked with Jesús Bosque
Peter Dukakis was an undergraduate student visiting as part of the DF/HCC CURE Program during the summer, who worked with Jesús Bosque
David Miao was an undergraduate student visiting from the University of Toronto during the summer, who worked with Victor V. Onecha
Laura Smith is a remote student from Reed College currently working with Victor V. Onecha
Daniel Suarez-García was an international PhD student visiting our lab from the Universidad de Sevilla

This year, our lab has been prolific in publishing, with the following articles either accepted or published in 2024:

Huesa-Berral C, Withrow JD, Dawson RJ, Beekman C, Bolch WE, Paganetti H, Wehrenberg-Klee E, Bertolet A. MIDOS: a novel stochastic model towards a treatment planning system for microsphere dosimetry in liver tumors. Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging. 2024 May; 51(6):1506-1515. PMID: 38155237; PMCID: PMC11043005.
Bobic M, Huesa-Berral C, Terry JF, Kunz L, Schuemann J, Fisher DR, Maitz CA, Bertolet A. Monte Carlo dosimetric analyses on the use of 90Y-IsoPet intratumoral therapy in canine subjects. Phys Med Biol. 2024 Aug 02; 69(16). PMID: 39053508; PMCID: PMC11583174.
Huesa-Berral C, Terry JF, Kunz L, Bertolet A. Sequencing microsphere selective internal radiotherapy after external beam radiotherapy for hepatocellular carcinoma: proof of concept of a synergistic combination. Br J Radiol. 2024 Oct 17. PMID: 39418205.
Kunz LV, Bosque JJ, Nikmaneshi M, Chamseddine I, Munn LL, Schuemann J, Paganetti H, Bertolet A. AMBER: A Modular Model for Tumor Growth, Vasculature and Radiation Response. Bull Math Biol. 2024 Oct 26; 86(12):139. PMID: 39460828.

… as well as all these articles together with our collaborators:

Wehrenberg-Klee E, An T, Heidari P, Huesa-Berral H, Dreher M, Eldridge A, Fowers K, Schuemann J, Bertolet A. SPECT-CT Dosimetry of Bronchial Artery 99mTc-MAA Injection in Pulmonary Malignancies: Feasibility Evaluation of Bronchial Artery 90Y Radioembolization. Radiology (accepted).
Onecha VV, Espinosa-Rodriguez A, Briz JA, España S, Garcia G, García-Díez M, Ibáñez P, Nouvilas VM, Sanchez-Parcerisa D, Udías JM, Viñals S, Fraile LM. Reaction yields and angular distributions of prompt γ-rays for range verification in proton therapy using ¹⁸O. Rad Phys Chem. 2024 Apr; 217(111485).
Meyer I, Peters N, Tamborino G, Lee H, Bertolet A, Faddegon B, Mille MM, Lee C, Schuemann J, Paganetti H. A framework for in-field and out-of-field patient specific secondary cancer risk estimates from treatment plans using the TOPAS Monte Carlo system. Phys Med Biol. 2024 Aug 06; 69(16). PMID: 39019051; PMCID: PMC11345907.
Quintana JM, Jiang F, Kang M, Onecha VV, Könik A, Qin L, Rodriguez VE, Hu H, Borges N, Khurana I, Banla LI, Le Fur M, Caravan P, Schuemann J, Bertolet A, Weissleder R, Miller MA, Ng TSC. Localized in vivo prodrug activation using radionuclides. Journal of Nuclear Medicine (accepted). PMID: 39211146; PMCID: PMC11361159.
Chamseddine I, Shah K, Lee H, Ehret F, Schuemann J, Bertolet A, Shih HA, Paganetti H. Decoding Patient Heterogeneity Influencing Radiation-Induced Brain Necrosis. Clin Cancer Res. 2024 Oct 01; 30(19):4424-4433. PMID: 39106090; PMCID: PMC11444871.
Rothwell B, Bertolet A, Schuemann J. Proton FLASH-arc therapy (PFAT): A feasibility study for meeting FLASH dose-rate requirements in the clinic. Radiother Oncol. 2024 Nov 09; 202:110623. PMID: 39528113.
García-Cardosa M, Meiriño R, Calvo FA, Antolín E, Aguilar B, Vidorreta M, Cuevas R, Barbés B, Huesa-Berral C, Azcona JD, Burguete J. FLIP: a novel method for patient-specific dose quantification in circulating blood in large vessels during proton or photon external beam radiotherapy treatments. Phys Med Biol. 2024 Nov 14; 69(22). PMID: 39498521.
Shin WG, D-Kondo JN, Ramos-Mendez JA, LaVerne JA, Rothwell BC, Bertolet A, McNamara A, Faddegon BA, Paganetti H, Schuemann J. Investigation of hydrogen peroxide yields and oxygen consumption in high dose rate irradiation: a TOPAS-nBio Monte Carlo study. Phys Med Biol. 2024 Dec 10. PMID: 39657326

… and these manuscripts, currently submitted and under review:

Onecha VV, Schuemann J, Paganetti H, Bertolet A. Extending the Microdosimetry Gamma Model (MGM) to estimate induced DNA damage and its complexity at macroscopic scale by protons and helium ions. Submitted to Radiotherapy and Oncology (preprint)
Onecha VV, Suarez-Garcia D, Bosque JJ, Lee H, Simpkins F, Gitto SB, Pryma DA, Bertolet A. Space- and time-defined Monte Carlo dosimetry explains ovarian cancer cell viability in targeted α-particle therapy with [²¹¹At]PTT. Submitted to International Journal of Radiation Oncology Biology Physics.
Dukakis P, Bosque JJ, Bertolet A. Exploring Biochemical Considerations for Diffusive Alpha Radiation Therapy (DaRT) Models. Submitted to Physica Medica.

We are grateful for the invaluable collaborations with exceptional researchers who generously shared their time and expertise. In particular, thanks to Dan Pryma and Sarah Gitto from the University of Pennsylvania; Eric Wehrenberg-Klee from MGH Interventional Radiology; Pedram Heidari, Shadi Esfahani, Umar Mahmoud, Thomas Ng, and Aileen O’Shea from MGH Nuclear Medicine; Ross Berbeco from the BWH Division of Physics; Miguel Cortés-Giraldo from the Universidad de Sevilla; Wesley Bolch and Bobby Dawson from the University of Florida; Mailyn Perez-Liva from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid; Franziska Michor from the Dana Farber Cancer Institute; Bruce Rosen and Josh Marchant from the Martinos Center at MGH; José Ramos-Méndez from the University of California San Francisco; Jean-Pierre Pouget and Julie Constanzo from INSERM, and all others that have dedicated their time to our lab during this year.

Of course, special thanks to the entire MGH Radiation Oncology team, especially Jennifer Ferguson, Zeina Chaptini, Rachel Strauss, and Anna Ngwananogu for their administrative support; Daphne Haas-Kogan, Henning Willers, Thomas Bortfeld, Brian Winey and many others for their active promotion and support of our research; and of course, Ali Ajdari, Konrad Nesteruk, Ibrahim Chamseddine, and especially Jan Schuemann and Harald Paganetti for their countless inputs and continuous advice and guidance, as well as the entire Physics Division and Physics Research group.